I haven’t been posting lately because I’ve been either super busy, sick, or in the middle of feeling down and didn’t want to bring my negativity out for everyone to see. I’m back now, though I feel bad that I’m posting this before a scheduled Weekend Wrap-Up tomorrow. It won’t stay at the top long but at least it’s a way to be sure nobody thinks I’ve abandoned writing about my life altogether.

I have a lot of thoughts that I want to get out, so bear with me, this may be long. Those of you reading this on LJ, sorry if it ends up taking up a whole page! Forgive me?

Alright, so my first thought is the seasons changing. I bought cider and donuts the other day and it was a great idea. Bad for my “diet”? Perhaps. But good for my mind so I allowed myself to do it. Cider and donuts has always been a special autumn thing for me. My family and I would go to the apple orchard every year when I was young and pick some apples, and then buy a few big jugs of cider and some plain donuts for dipping. Nobody here seems to understand that cider and donuts go together. It makes me a tiny bit homesick, but it’s nothing that I can’t handle. I have to just remember that just because it’s not already a common thing here doesn’t mean that I can’t bring it here to share!

I want to go out to the apple orchard/cider mill/pumpkin patch this year. I want to see a haunted house. I want to have a pumpkin spice Blizzard from DQ. I want to take a bunch of photos of the painting that nature is providing me with, so I can look at them and remember that autumn really is amazing and less depressing than just a segue into winter. I told Matt that I want him to take me to one of the above (orchard/mill/patch) this year since we have a new car and can get there without worrying about my car. I don’t know yet if we’ll go but I’m hoping we do.

Yes, we have a new car. Well, technically Matt does (since I don’t “exist” in Canada still) but it’s ours anyway. It’s gorgeous and wonderful and I love it. Matt needed it for the winter because my car doesn’t handle the snow properly and I really don’t need him to be in an accident. For those of you that don’t know, most of Halifax is on a hill, so in a rear wheel drive car on ice and snow, there’s pretty much nothing to do but close your eyes (as a passenger, not a driver!) and pray. For those wondering what kind of car it is, it’s a 2008 Pontiac G6. We got it from a dealer who slashed the price WAY down (yay!) and it was brand new - only 36km on it when we bought it (double yay!) so with the warranty and all the included options it was really a no-brainer. So far, we’re absolutely loving it! I don’t have any photos right now because the weather’s been pretty gloomy lately but I’ll share some when I have them.

As for what I’ve been up to these past few weeks, here’s some insight. I’ve been volunteering with Frontier College. I’m finding it to be rewarding in many ways. I’m helping our coordinator get on her feet (it’s her first year and so she’s pretty much trying to get everything started again!) and tutoring a young woman who is struggling to get her GED. She’s not been the most reliable for getting ahold of me but I’m trying to show her that I’m not giving up on her. I think that’s what these learners need - someone to rely on and someone who believes in them. Anyway, I’m going to volunteer training (my second session, even though I’ve attended one I figured another couldn’t hurt) today from 12-4. I’m liking the volunteering thing because it’s got me out of my comfort zone. I take the bus almost daily to get to the university (it really entails taking TWO buses, which was terrifying at first) and I make phone calls/attend meetings with people. I’m thinking the more I do and the more people I talk to and the more I get out of my comfort zone, the more valuable I feel, even to myself, and the more my confidence will start going back up.

Matt planned a surprise for me a few days ago. He gave me three clues as to what it was, and none of them gave it away. He got me into the car, told me to bring sandals (instead of heels) and the camera, and off we went. The surprise? He took me to the ocean! I love living on the ocean. We’ve been to Peggy’s Cove a few times, but I do like going a place with a beach from time to time to just soak it all in. Here’s a few shots from our trip to Lawrencetown Beach, and there are a few more in the flickr set.

At the end of May, I made a post mentioning my expectations for the summer. As I find myself now needing two blankets at night most nights and looking out the window to see more grey dreariness than strong sunshine, I realize that September is here, and that means summer is over. The kids are back in school, the leaves will start changing soon, and tan lines will soon begin to fade, for those who spent a lot of time in the sun.

How did I measure up to my own expectations this summer? I think I did fairly well.

• I went to the beach a few times.
• I mailed my PR application out.
• I became more mobile, understanding the bus system enough to get around to where I need to.
• I made a couple of new friends - both online and locally!
• I spent lots of time at home with Matt, and we enjoyed the warmth without being out in the sun.

And now that summer’s over, Matt finished it off for me perfectly. He took me to the ocean! I’ll be posting about that later, though. It definitely deserves its own entry!

So how about you? Did you accomplish everything you’d hoped for this summer? What are your goals for autumn?

Title quote by Elizabeth Lawrence, as quoted on Quotegarden.

I’ve been very lazy about blogging the past few days, but that’s because I’ve been busy! Not busy doing anything spectacularly important, mind you. Just busy. Wasting time, I guess. I’ve been a bit antisocial, too, and I think it’s because I’m overwhelmed with my own stuff and while I completely appreciate that my friends come to me with their problems, I’m not doing a great job with handling them lately. So I do the best that I can and hope that they understand that I’m not trying to be a cold-hearted kind of person, but instead that I need to focus on straightening my life out first.

I’ve made a list of things that I need to do for immigration. The scary thing is that the list fits on one Post-It. I write big, too, so this means that it’s coming right down to the wire. I’ll be mailing it out hopefully by the end of the week. Scary? Yes. Terrifying. But I’m so ready for it all to be over already so I can move on with my life. The packet of information is already crazy thick, so I can’t wait to see just how thick it is when it’s done. Not to mention I’ll be waiting with my fingers crossed until the day that I get that envelope with the approval in it. Enough about that, though. I’ve already had my one allotted panic attack for the day regarding that!

I’ve spent the past three days at the beach. Not today, but the three days before that. Lots of sun, a bit of a burn, and lots of exercise. Swimming makes me happy. I prefer the ocean over lakes and to be honest, I prefer pools and wave pools over lakes too, but swimming is swimming and I’ll take it wherever I can get it! My shoulders and neck are a bit sore where they were burned but I have no regrets. I haven’t been out in the sun so much in over three years, so I’m well past due.

Last night Matt and I went with Jane and her boyfriend Rob to the casino for a thing with Matt’s coworkers. Jane and Rob are really close friends with Matt’s boss (they’re the reason he found out about the job!) so it was nice having them there. Another of Matt’s coworkers and his band were playing while we were there, and they were awesome! Absolutely fantastic band. It was nice to get out, have a night out, have some drinks and good music and just laugh. It felt so carefree. We gambled a tiny bit - when I say a tiny bit I mean that we used $10 in the slot machines and that was it. It was fun but we knew we didn’t want to spend too much. After the casino we decided that we really wanted some food (mind you, at this point I’d had a couple Smirnoff Ices and a Cosmopolitan, so I was along for the ride no matter where we were going!) so we stopped at a little pizza shop and got some take-out. Jane and I sat on the curb with our feet in the street and tried to figure out where everything was in relation to where we were standing (She definitely knew much more than I did about that!) while we waited for the food, and some crazy guy with no shoes came up asking for a light. After that, I managed to trip in a small hole in the sidewalk and skin my knee. Oh, the things you do when you’re a bit drunk. It was overall a great night though, honestly. I’d do it again in a heartbeat!

I’m debating whether to upload this short video that I have to youtube or not. It’s a guy at the casino that had obviously had a few drinks, and was apparently dancing with his daughter. Unfortunately he stopped shortly after I got the camera out, but I got some good footage! If I do upload it, you can bet I’ll be posting it here. It was one of the highlights of the night!

So much to talk about that it’s hard to know where to begin, so I guess the beginning would be a good start. So let’s see…

Woke up around 10:30 or so and confirmed my appointment for tomorrow. Scared out of my mind for the blood work because, let’s face it, who wants giant needles in their arm? Oh, well, though. A bit later, Katie (Matt’s brother’s fiancee, and a good friend of mine) called me to let me know that she’d be over to pick me up in a little while. I got dressed, emailed with my mom, and headed downstairs to wait.

Katie and I headed back to her place, where we sat around for a bit, mopped her kitchen floor, and chatted while playing with her daughter (my niece), Lannah. We went looking for Matt’s cousin to see if she’d watch Lannah while we went to the gym, but she wasn’t home. However, we saw a much more disturbing sight on the way to her place. We pulled onto a small side road and saw a boy (around 13 or so) on the ground with three boys on top of him, kicking and punching him while he flailed around. We locked our doors and rolled up our windows (I don’t care if they were 13, we weren’t taking any chances, as they were obviously not friendly to begin with) and as we were pulling into the parking lot we saw one of the boys’ faces - it turns out it was Matt’s cousin’s son. The son of the woman we were going to go find. I believe Katie’s going to talk to his mother later, and since we had no way of getting ahold of the police or anything and since the boys fled the scene, we couldn’t really do anything. I can honestly say it was scary though. I can’t imagine what young boys would have to fight that much about, really.

Anyway, Katie found a sitter for Lannah around 3:30ish and we headed out to the gym. I had my four photos taken for my medical tomorrow while Katie ran to the bank, and then we headed up and she had her orientation for the gym while I wandered around with them. Then we did a bit of cardio warm-up on the bike, the weight circuit, and then 5 minutes on the treadmill. We decided to stop there so we’re not too sore for the next couple days, and we’re going to go back Friday. I think having her around will really help my motivation, and I hope I can do the same for her!

After that, we decided to go swimming (even though the sun and heat and humidity had all but disappeared by this point) so she took me back to my apartment so I could put on my swimsuit and grab a towel, and we headed out to the lake. We swam for about a half hour, in ice cold water, talking about how we’d waited a year to do this again. Regardless of how cold it was, it felt fantastic and I think it was a great way to relax my muscles down after a nice workout.

After this, I came home and made BLTs with Matt, played some EQ2, and am sitting here just relaxing. Tomorrow, I’m going to clean up the apartment during the day, and then head out to the doctor for my medical, and then the hospital for my X-rays and blood work. All in all, it was a great day. Summer’s officially here!